Poor Little Rich Boy
by Dulcet Darling
Summary: The return to Hogwarts, post-war, has caused a change in Draco—poor little rich boy, you don't want to be alone. Very loose song-fic, with a lot more to offer. (Much bantering, kissing, and exploration within!)
1. poor little rich boy

**title** poor little rich boy  
><strong>prompt<strong> regina spektor's song by the same title  
><strong>pairing<strong> draco x harry

**more about **_This is, by all rights, a song fic._ But don't think of it like a lyrical, poetic, follow-the-song-exactly type deal. I've never before written a fanfiction to specific music—I don't even listen to it while I'm writing, since I tend to get lost in my songs. However, today I was listening to _Poor Little Rich Boy_ by the lovely and talented Regina Spektor (may not be to everyone's taste) and was reminded of Draco Malfoy. I think this will not really be AU, but a nondescript affair at a completely unremarkable time after the war with little comment on scenery. It'll be mostly internal.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

** o**

_Poor little rich boy, all the couples have gone  
>You wish that they hadn't, you don't wanna be alone<em>

Draco Malfoy sat alone at the table, rain hitting the pavement outside the cafe window with a sound like a drill. Not that Draco would know that sound if he heard it, being of a ridiculously sheltered pureblood family. His sitting in the relatively muggle-looking little food shop was probably the only thing he had ever done to tarnish his Malfoy name, and even that was questionable as this particular teashop was tucked up inside of Hogsmeade. Oh, and anyway, his parents would hardly care anymore. It wasn't as though Draco was exactly anti-Potter at this point, and that made him close to blood traitor as a Malfoy could be... without being an obscure, sympathetic relation like Sirius Black. Draco was spending an absurd amount of his new last year at Hogwarts outside of the school—there seemed to be fewer restrictions on those students who had been involved in the battle. Regardless of which side they had been on. The boy ran a hand through pale blond hair impatiently and glanced around the emptying room. There were only a few straggling couples, arms about each other, a few seemingly joined at the face... and the noises emanating thereof. Clearly they had plans for this rainy afternoon, and Draco would remain sitting on the uncomfortable stool, drinking whatever was brought him.

_But they wanna kiss and they got homes of their own  
>Poor little rich boy all the couples have gone, have gone, have gone<em>

The bell above the doorway tinkled as the last couple left and Draco Malfoy allowed his mind to wander. All the changes might go back to Potter—fine, _Voldemort_—but the dissatisfaction he felt in his own life was entirely his own problem. Or perhaps Pansy's. Yes, Draco quite liked that idea. He evidently wasn't upset at _himself_, it was bloody, pernickety Pansy Parkinson who was causing this discomfiture. Obviously she was a pretty girl, but that had stopped being enough for Draco a while back. Not only was he beginning to tire of her ridiculous antics and constant clinging and _touching_, but most of the girls in the castle had lost their appeal for him. It was the same with every one of them—'I'm fat', 'my boyfriend doesn't really care', 'Draco, would you please pay _attention_ to me'. Didn't help that most of them were thinner than thin and thoroughly concerned with themselves exclusively. Another hand pushed back and through his hair and Draco was thinking he might give up women and people altogether. Move into a hut in the forest. Of course, there wasn't coffee in the forest, was there?

_And you don't love your girlfriend  
>You don't love your girlfriend<br>And you think that you should but she thinks that she's fat  
>But she isn't but you don't love her anyway<em>

And anyway, his mother would miss him. Lucius Malfoy had found his way back into Azkaban following the events of the previous year, and although Draco found himself past the point of caring, Narcissa Malfoy pined for her husband. She looked so pale and lost without him that Draco was frequently embarrassed to be around her, particularly when she was grieving. She was not behaving like a Malfoy; this was some weak defect of the Black family, this tendency to wallow in sadness and refuse to move on. Draco was moving on fine. It was perfectly all right that the way he seemed to cope best was by ignoring the letters his father sent—by tossing them in the fire when his mother wasn't looking. It was no good having her weeping pathetically over his shoulder as Lucius's writing turned black with heat and ignorance.

_And you don't love your mother  
>And you know that you should<br>And you wish that you would  
>But you don't anyway<em>

Well. He was at Hogwarts now, and away from all that. His mother was probably drowning herself in the strongest drink the house elves could find and he was... sitting alone in a dingy cafe in Hogsmeade? No he was not.

It didn't take long for Draco to reach the Quidditch pitch. It took less time for him to realize that that was not where he wanted to be. He dismounted his broom quickly and wandered out of the driving rain, into the pounding warmth of the showers. Allowing the water to turn his pale hair a deeper shade of blond, Draco watched the water twirl down the drain at his feet. Staying awake was proving difficult. His eyes simply refused to stay open, and they began to drift every time he stopped moving. In order to avoid a brutal drowning, passed out via knock on the head from the tile floor, he exited the shower. Wrapping a towel around his waist, Draco cast a perfunctory glance around the locker room, expecting to see empty benches, to confirm his loneliness perhaps. Instead his eyes momentarily locked with a pair of green ones which narrowed and flicked away. Potter must have had the same idea, as he was wearing his Quidditch robes—though none of the equipment usually worn for games or practices—and sopping wet.

_Poor little rich boy, all the world is okay  
>The water runs off your skin and down into the drain<em>

A stony silence permeated the air as Potter toweled off his hair and Draco slipped back into his clothing; when he was appropriately dressed, he sat on one of the benches and let his head fall forward onto his hands. When had he become so _tired_?

"Malfoy," another voice broke the silence. "If you're going to sleep, would you mind going back to your dormitory to do it? I'd like to change."

Git.

"Oh what, and I'm stopping you doing that by sitting over here with my eyes closed, am I?" Draco retorted. "Would you rather I watch?" Nothing nastier came from his mouth, as he was far too tired. And anyway, Potter was being relatively civil. Their new post-war coldness had so far refused to erupt into the flame of hatred it had previously been. Keeping a quiet eye on Potter as the dark-haired boy peeled off his cold, wet clothing, Draco couldn't resist the urge to comment.

"You don't plan on showering after you've sweat all over your robes?"

"I was hardly out there long enough to '_sweat_'. It's pouring rain, in case you'd missed it."

"Then at least you'd be warm."

"I'll be fine."

Draco strode over in Potter's general direction, to his Quidditch locker. He was still captain; one of the few highlights in his currently dismal life. He had his reading, but honestly, if Muggle Studies was the only subject that was going to assign books, he had no idea why he'd even come back to Hogwarts.

_You're reading Fitzgerald, you're reading Hemmingway  
>They're both super smart and drinking in the cafes<em>

As he pulled _For Whom the Bell Tolls_ from the locker and shoved it into his book bag, he happened to catch an envy-inducing glimpse of Potter's naked torso. Damn it. Draco was well aware that there were girls who admired his elegance and slighter figure... but there was something much more appealing about a thicker, muscled frame. There wasn't much that he wouldn't give to have Potter's body—he'd certainly trade his mother any day. Or Pansy.

_And you don't love your girlfriend  
>You don't love your girlfriend<br>And you think that you should but she thinks that she's fat  
>But she isn't but you don't love her anyway<em>

The shaggy, black head lifted and Potter met Draco's gaze casually.

"It's weird, isn't it?"

"What's _weird_, Potter?" Draco sighed. "I'm too tired for riddles."

"This. Being in the same room without having tried to hex one another."

"Don't tempt me."

"I'm serious. Not bad weird, really, as I like the current arrangement of my face, but... weird."

Draco nodded. "Although why you're so fond of _your_ face, I'm not sure." That wasn't entirely true; Potter's eyes were wide and that startling green, his nose was distinct, his jaw defined. All in all he had an appealing look about him.

"I'm choosing to ignore that." There was a cheerful note to Potter's voice, one that Draco wasn't sure he liked. They were bantering now, not arguing. Almost like they were friends. "Anyway, I like being able to do this. Obviously I wouldn't if Ron or one of your minions were here. But talking to you is alright."

"Oh, now you're keen on being friendly?"

"What, as opposed to when you were in arms with the man who was trying to kill me?"

"That's not what I meant." Draco glowered. "_That_'s understandable."

"Well then, what are you going on about?"

"First year." He muttered.

Potter guffawed loudly, stopping half-way through pulling on his shirt to bend over with laughter.

"_That_'s it? _That_ is why you don't like me? Because I snubbed you in first year?" Potter chuckled roughly, his eyes wide with disbelief. "I don't believe you."

"Really? You don't believe a Malfoy would be so petty as to take offense at a declination of friendship from the famous Harry Potter?"

"Well, when you put it like that." Potter grinned over at him, and Draco smiled tentatively back. Even if his family was the brunt of his own joke, Potter was right—this kind of weird wasn't so bad. Potter's eyes grew serious and there was something about them that drew Draco in, that made him forget about his family—about the struggles, and the pathetic nature of it all. About Azkaban. About Voldemort.

_And you don't love your mother  
>And you know that you should<br>And you wish that you would  
>But you don't anyway<em>

"You know, Malfoy," Potter said, and suddenly he was closing the short distance between them until they were less than a wand-length apart. "We could very well have been friends."

"Really?" Draco drawled, his breath coming a little short. "Because your stubborn refusal to call me by my first name would suggest otherwise."

"You don't call me Harry... and you don't look like a _Draco_." Potter responded. Oh, fine. If Draco was going to complain about _Harry_ calling him Malfoy, he may as well start thinking of the other boy in terms of his given name. "That's a lizard-y name. Although, really, there were plenty of times when I thought it suited you fine—Malfoy just sounds more like an insult."

"Thanks."

"You know what I mean."

"I do. And that's why, if we're going to be friends, I'm going to call you Harry." Well, that was brazen.

And then Potter—Harry—was stepping towards Draco, closing the distance, muttering "I don't want to be your friend", and pressing his lips to the blond's. Draco's entire body stiffened with shock and his stomach was consumed with a nervous clenching of muscles. Draco Malfoy, confident in everything—especially his superiority—was absolutely lost in this situation. Whereas, he noted cynically, the young Mr. Harry _Gets-everything-he-wants_ Potter was having no qualms about wrapping his arms around Draco's waist and kissing him harder. Fine. Potter wasn't going to be the only one who enjoyed this. Harry. Whatever.

They were just two boys—and they were so ruled by hormones—and they had no idea what the hell they were doing—and now they were joined at the lips. Draco ran his hands down the dark-haired boy's body carefully, and then jerked away.

_You're so young, you're so goddamn young_

Much as he wanted to convince himself that is was right, and good, and fine—and damned if it didn't feel that way—there was something distinctly wrong about him shacking up with Harry Potter out by the Quidditch pitch. Six years of hatred didn't dissolve like that. This was not how normal people functioned. So what? _So what?_ Because Pansy wouldn't be making out with the first Gryffindor she came across, suddenly Draco wasn't allowed to kiss whoever he wanted?

_You're so goddamn young_

Pansy. And that brought on another wild train of thought that reminded Draco that not only had he kissed Harry, but this particular object of his hot-and-bothered affection was decidedly male. Potter was—_Harry, Harry, Harry_. Harry was looking at Draco with nervous confusion, and the blond boy didn't miss the way that his eyes were flicking to his wand on the bench. When Draco made his retort, the voice that came through his throat was hoarse.

"What happened to not hexing one another?" He croaked under his breath.

"I'm sorry," Harry returned, equally quiet. His hands were extended, palm up, in a placating gesture. "That was uncalled for."

"That's not it," came the response, Draco's voice muffled by the recently re-adopted head-in-hands pose he was affecting as he sat heavily down. "You're not my biggest problem."

Harry nodded and began to pick up his things carefully. When he had collected all his various bits and pieces, he turned as though he were going to say something before, instead, heading out the door silently.

Draco let out a heavy sigh.

_And you don't love your girlfriend_

** o**

**A/N** I am now no longer sure whether or not this is a one-shot. I suppose if I feel like it, I'll keep moving this along. Right now it's slated as complete. If I do continue, the rating will increase as it's bound to get dirty.


	2. all the couples have gone

**title** poor little rich boy  
><strong>prompt <strong>regina spektor's song by the same title  
><strong>pairing <strong>draco x harry

**more about **Right, no longer a song-fic one-shot drabble, it still has its roots in music. And for once, I tried to listen to music while I was writing it… that was a gong show. It's ridiculously short, this chapter of mine, and doesn't flow particularly well. The song for this chapter was _Call Me _by Shinedown.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

** o**

Every _single_ time Draco found his mind wandering back to the scene by the pitch, his entire body surrendered to nervous, embarrassed muscle spasms and his face turned red. Well, not fire-engine, Weasley-red, but the more delicate Malfoy pink that had been more than enough to draw Pansy's attention within the first hour following. She had finally managed to worm out of him where he had been and who he'd been with, though certainly not exactly what he'd been up to. That was when the shouting had begun. Didn't Draco realize that Harry Potter was the reason the families of half their house were in ruin? Didn't that mean a thing to him? And what about his own family? When Draco had dared to respond that perhaps the war criminals were in Azkaban for a reason, Pansy had promptly hit him and exited his dormitory.

Two days later, he considered their relationship over.

Unfortunately without such a strong pureblood tie to his fellow housemates as Pansy Parkinson had been, he was even more ousted; no longer part of a family with a solid Voldemort-sympathising patriarch, and with Pansy making sure to tell everyone who would listen that he was in cohorts with Potter and gang. Really, as if it weren't bad enough that she thought he was buddies with Potter, now the entire castle seemed to think he was holding hands and singing the school song with Granger and Weasley, too. The most mortifying part of it all, however, was that eventually Potter was going to hear about it. And being predictable Gryffindor number one, _Harry_ was going to be sympathetic and supportive and attempt to draw him into the fold. Then he would be a Gryffindor in all but uniform.

It was this surprising, if not illogical, insight into the inner workings of the brain of the Boy Who Lived which allowed Draco to react without surprise when he was approached at breakfast in the Great Hall, and to appear entirely unaffected as he followed Harry Potter into the corridor. It was also these predictions which caused his jaw to drop unceremoniously when the first venomous words out of Potter's mouth were, "What the _hell_ have you been telling people, _Malfoy_?"

"I beg your pardon?" Briefly, Draco's mind recalled their conversation days ago, and he was aware that the way that Potter spat his name was certainly intended to be insulting.

"I said, _what have you been telling people_? Why is it that every time I leave the common room someone has a snide comment to make about _me_ going off to visit _you_?"

Draco thought this was rather unfair; after all, people were always talking behind Potter's back and, to be honest, to his face. It wasn't new—and hadn't he considered that whatever had gone on the other afternoon, Draco didn't exactly want everyone at Hogwarts thinking that he and Undesirable Number One were mates?

"_I_ haven't said anything, thanks, Potter."

"Really? Because this all seems to have started after—" Harry floundered, unsure of whether or not he wanted to bring that world into this one.

"After I came back to the Slytherin common room and had to explain where exactly I'd been to a very disgruntled Pansy Parkinson?"

"_Fuck_, Malfoy!" It wasn't the volume of Potter's voice that caused Draco to flinch, as he was keeping a fairly _sotto_ tone, so much as the language. Obviously cussing wasn't new to him, but from the Golden Boy? That was a first. "So you get back and immediately tell your girlfriend you were out—" his voice dropped again. "—snogging someone else?"

"Potter," Malfoy growled. "What I do and do not tell my housemates is not your business, but, so that we're clear, you should understand I told her _only_ who I was with. It's _her_ you should be cornering and griping at, as I do not have the time or inclination to stand around and listen to it."

"Really, Malfoy? You tell her you were down by the Quidditch pitch with me and she turns it into some school-wide joke?"

"You seem totally ignorant of how damaging fraternization with you _is_ to a Slytherin reputation."

"That—is—ridiculous." Each word was clear and forcefully enunciated. However, it was apparent to Draco that Potter was losing steam. Obviously he had expected to come out here and find that Draco had declared Harry Potter his first love, and told all of Slytherin that they were going to elope together. Finding a boy who was equally annoyed left him with little idea of how to proceed. "Finding out that we talked once does not give the entire school fodder enough to make gay jokes until the world ends."

"Excuse me?" Draco said, cocking an eyebrow. He was sure he knew where this was headed. "Has anyone actually made a _gay_ joke specifically? Or is your guilty conscience getting the better of you?"

Harry blushed an extremely flattering shade of red, and Draco was suddenly aware that he was having a proper conversation in a lonely corridor with the boy he had been kissing just days ago.

"Yeah," Draco nodded. "I thought so."

"To be fair, anyone in my situation would have thought the same. I mean, you kiss me, break up with your girlfriend and suddenly Pansy tells everyone we're spending all our free time together?"

"I think, Mr. Potter, that it was _you_ who kissed _me_." Draco said, and he found that he was leaning forward, and _smiling_, damn it, so close to Harry that when the Gryffindor next spoke his breath ghosted across Draco's lips.

"Right."

"What the _fuck_?" This exclamation startled Draco more than the same word had coming from Harry's mouth—and this time not because he doubted the elocution of its creator—so much so that he jumped nearly a foot away from Potter before even turning to see who had spoken. Really, it was no surprise that he found himself looking directly at Ron Weasley. Since when did the Weasel ever leave Potter's side for more than a minute? It wasn't until Weasley turned around, as though making for the door, that Draco stopped mentally ridiculing him long enough to recognize the threat. He could not be permitted to re-enter the Great Hall without some explanation—so Draco did the first thing he could think of. He petrified him.

"_Petrificus totalus!_"

"Malfoy!"

"Well!"

Ron's body had hit the floor immediately, and Harry had come out of his slack-jawed trance quickly enough to be offended on his redheaded friend's behalf. Honestly, this would make explaining the situation even harder.

"Well? Well, now I have to take Ron up to the common room before somebody comes through the damn doorway and sees you with your wand out. And you had best hope that Hermione gets him up before class starts."

"Oh, Merlin, Potter, I don't want to hear about the sex lives of your little friends," Draco said in disgust, catching the accidental innuendo. When Harry still looked confused, he simply rolled his eyes and headed for the door. "Later, Potter. I still haven't eaten yet, thanks to you."

"Yeah," Harry said, facing the problem at hand unenthusiastically. "Later."

** o**

Later, during a particularly uneventful Transfiguration class, Draco would watch a groggy-looking Weasley, flanked by Granger and Potter, wander into the room ten minutes late and barely bat an eye as their house was docked five points (Draco thought, ruefully, that McGonagall would have taken five points from _him_, let alone two more of his house mates, had he been late.) However, it was only Harry whose eyes met his.

** o**

**A/N** Pssh, yeah, it's not a one shot. Only because I'm a sucker for a decent ending and … well, chapter one did _not_ have a decent ending.


	3. you wish that they hadn't

**title** poor little rich boy  
><strong>prompt <strong>regina spektor's song by the same title  
><strong>pairing <strong>draco x harry

**more about **This chapter's song was AFI's End Transmission. No especial significance and I don't think it comes through in the writing—just some trivia for you.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

** o**

Not just later, but weeks later. Draco was sitting in the Room of Requirement—silly thing, he'd finally learned the proper name for it—skiving off Potions. He couldn't bring himself to sit through a lecture today.

Harry—yeah, he was very definitely "Harry" now—had been... confusing, to say the least. He seemed to be taunting Draco with his friendship. Meeting him in the Room, talking to him. Not once, since the day that would live forever in Draco's mind as _The Contentious Petrification of Weasley _(so called for the irritation that Harry still displayed when it was mentioned), had they been anywhere near close enough to kiss. Not that Draco thought he would take the opportunity if it was presented—it was just unusual to him that Harry refused to enter into anything which might be misconstrued as physical intimacy, despite the intervening weeks and their increasing enjoyment of one another's company. Whatever happened to that "_I don't want to be your friend_" bullocks?

To be entirely truthful, that hadn't been mentioned, either. Harry seemed reluctant to broach the topic and Draco certainly wasn't going to bring it up—after all, despite being decidedly bisexual, Draco had had a definite preference for human beings of the female persuasion up to this point and had never been in an open relationship with a guy. Let alone a Gryffindor. No, he didn't think he wanted a relationship with Harry—they didn't even talk about... feelings. None of that bullshit. Just casual talk about other members of their respective Houses, Quidditch, the weather, what the squid was up to. The closest they'd come to a real conversation had been Draco venting about his own sense of isolation in Slytherin, and he'd felt a complete ass afterwards.

Occupied as he was by these thoughts, Draco did not immediately notice Harry making his entrance. It wasn't until the _thud_ of a heavy bag hitting the floor forced him to raise his head that he became aware of sharing the space with another human being.

"Hey," Harry said—not really greeting Draco, just announcing his presence as though the bag hadn't already done the job. For his part, Draco only nodded in response.

"Aren't you supposed to be in Potions?" was the next, predictable query from the dark-haired boy's mouth.

"You are _such_ a Gryffindor, Harry," Draco shot back. "And not any more. It ended exactly three minutes before you turned up."

Harry grinned a little in response to what he (Draco belatedly realized) would have considered a compliment, but he said nothing in return. Draco was grateful for that. Harry drew an old bit of folded parchment and a quill from the previously violently rejected bag and settled on the same sofa on which Draco was currently seated... at the opposite end. That was the kind of thing that confused Draco. It wasn't that he expected Harry to walk in and sit on his lap, but the distance between them was oddly forced. Surely Harry didn't _need_ to press himself up against the farthest arm from where Draco was seated? It was time for some experimentation.

"What're you working on?" Draco asked, sliding down the sofa to look over Harry's shoulder at the parchment (it was blank.) Harry did a near-magical thing with his body, the turning of which caused more space to appear between Draco and himself—and also hid the parchment from Draco's view. Draco raised an eyebrow quizzically and Harry laughed, clearly uncomfortable.

"Just, uh, writing." Draco's eyebrows moved even further up on his forehead in response. "Essay. For Potions." Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, Harry made a face that indicated he knew he'd screwed up.

"Really? Because I was under the impression that Potions hadn't assigned any essays recently, and as the eighth years _very_ often share Potions classes, Gryffindors and Slytherins especially, it seems more than likely that I would have to write the same one."

"Err, yeah. I meant Divination."

"Oh, come on, Harry," Draco sighed. "What is it? It's a bloody blank piece of parchment, it can't be anything too terribly secret."

"It's a bloody blank piece of parchment, Draco." Harry grinned and raised his own eyebrows. Draco wasn't laughing. "Honestly, you're like a child. You're only interested because I won't tell you."

"Maybe I'm just interested for your sake, hmm?" Draco said, more than a little peeved at this unfair assessment. "Can't I take an interest in your life at this point?"

"Why would you?" came the reply, and now Harry was beginning to sound frustrated as well. "Let's be honest, shall we: once any conversation gets past the polite 'hello's and 'how are you?'s, you lose interest. That's all this was, only now it isn't, so let it go."

"If that were the case—which it isn't—" Draco began. "—you'd think that you would be willing to fix the damn problem."

"_You're_ the problem! And what do you mean, 'it isn't the case'? Of course it is. Draco, we never talk about... anything. Not real things."

And Draco couldn't really argue, because he'd just been thinking the same thing. Except: "Well, that's not my fault exclusively, is it? It's not like you come in here, sit down and talk about all the tribulations of your childhood as the Golden Boy."

Harry seemed to consider Draco for a moment, and the Slytherin wondered if perhaps he'd gotten through. He wanted to clap his hands, or jump up, or otherwise express his ecstasy when Harry spoke next.

"Is that what you want?"

"Well, not exactly. I imagine I've got a pretty clear understanding of your childhood, actually. But I do want to know what the hell that ruddy piece of parchment paper is."

Harry laughed out loud and rolled his eyes.

"Ah, now you've caused a problem. This piece of paper is the essence of my childhood around the castle, and since you don't want to hear about that..." Harry sighed wistfully and moved as though he would put the paper into the pocket of his pants. Draco grabbed his wrist with lightning speed.

"Don't be a prick, Potter." Harry looked at him. "Uh. Please?"

"Fine," the Gryffindor answered. "But only because you have such a way with words."

Harry drew his wand from the pocket of his robes and just touched the tip to the blank piece of parchment. Draco grinned eagerly—he couldn't help himself, he loved to see new kinds of magic performed and this bit of paper was starting to get exciting—and just missed whatever it was that Harry whispered. Clearly he still didn't trust Draco enough to utter the phrase aloud, which was a little offensive, but he would take whatever he could get. More importantly, ink had begun to flow liberally from the wand tip and as Draco watched, a map bloomed on what had previously been the empty parchment before him. It took another several seconds for him to process what he was seeing—which was a moving map of the entirety of Hogwarts castle.

"Merlin, Harry!"

Harry just grinned at him, looking extremely pleased with himself. If he'd had any misgivings about sharing his secret with Draco, they seemed to have vanished in the presence of the blond's barefaced admiration.

"What—where on earth did you get this thing?"

"Fred and George," Harry told him and Draco nodded.

"I might have known this was one of their infernal conjurings."

"Nah, they didn't make it," Harry told him. "My... my dad did. Well, and Remus and Sirius." There was an awkward pause in which Draco thought Harry might have meant to add another name, but he did not continue.

"Wait, as in Professor Lupin? And Sirius Black?" The story of Harry's godfather had come out after the war; he was discussed in detail in a great many of the biographies on The Boy Who Lived and so what if Draco had read them? He had an interest in the war. That's all.

"Yeah, I guess."

"Merlin," Draco repeated. The concept of synonyms seemed to have escaped him. Then his attention was caught by something on the map—he leaned across Harry's lap and peered closely at the moving inkblots. "Is that _us_!?"

"Yep," Harry laughed. "The map shows where everyone in the castle is—even in the Room, although it can't tell you how to get in."

Draco was captured by the little lines, his face lit up with enthusiasm. That was him! On the map! The little set of footprints, with his name written in a flowing scrawl underneath. He stood up and wandered to the other side of the room, and Harry's gaze followed him curiously.

"Don't watch me!" Draco cried, pointing a finger at the map. "Did I move?"

"Of course you did," Harry told him, eyebrows raised quizzically, although he seemed to be trying not to laugh. "That's how the map works." Draco rushed back to the sofa and glared at the map. His little set of footprints was already back where it had been, so close to Harry's that it looked as though they were on top of one another. Draco's stomach squirmed.

"You know," he said, looking up into Harry's face from his place on the sofa, "This is the closest you've let me get to you since... well."

Harry coloured a little and his eyes flickered downward. "You told me you had bigger problems, Draco." Those green eyes looked up again. "I'm not going to force myself on you when you have other things to deal with."

Draco rolled his eyes.

"Did you not consider that perhaps I was indulging a rare moment of late teenage angst? I was about to break up with my girlfriend, for Merlin's sake!" Not that he'd known that at the time. But still. "That didn't mean, 'Don't ever get within 5 feet of me.' Really, Potter. You're totally illogical."

"You also told me you weren't going to call me Potter anymore."

"That was back when I wanted to be your friend," Draco grinned. And then, feeling brave, added: "_You_ said you didn't want to be my friend."

"True," Harry nodded, still looking embarrassed. "But maybe you could stick with calling me Harry anyway."

"I'll think about it," Draco replied airily, waving his hand vaguely in Harry's direction.

"Really?" Harry asked, and his face was close to Draco's again, and Draco wasn't sure what was happening—but he dared to hope that maybe, just maybe— "Is there anything I can do to convince you?"

And then Harry was closing the distance between them, pressing his mouth to Draco's, and it was so much gentler than before and one of Harry's hands rose to cradle Draco's cheek and all the blond could do was kiss back and try not to melt. Harry pulled back a little, but Draco followed him, refusing to let Harry end the kiss on his terms. He felt the Gryffindor's mouth smile under his and finally drew away.

"That might just have done it."

** o**

**A/N** I'm not going to _ask_ for reviews—but it only takes 5 seconds for you to tell me whether or not you hated it.


	4. you don't wanna be alone

**title** poor little rich boy  
><strong>prompt <strong>regina spektor's song by the same title  
><strong>pairing <strong>draco x harry

**more about **Marianas Trench's _Ever After_ album on repeat. The whole. Damn. Time.  
><strong>also, a note<strong>_ on the Marauder's Map and the Room of Requirement: _it is speculated that the room never appeared on the Marauder's Map because James, Remus, Sirius and Peter never found it. I'm basically assuming that Harry's had Hermione help him add it, since he'd probably want to keep an eye on who could use the Room. After all, everyone in Dumbledore's Army knows how to get in. (It's also been magically reconstructed, so teachers probably know it exists. Fuck off, I do what I want.)

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

** o**

Draco rolled over in his bed. He was having an incredibly difficult time sleeping—already a bit of an insomniac, any emotional turbulence tended to make things worse—and, naturally, couldn't get Harry off his mind. They weren't dating. They weren't. Draco didn't like that word, didn't want to deal with the complications of an official relationship. However, they had been tentatively "together" for over two months now. Even so, for all Draco knew, Harry wasn't even out. He certainly had no reason to believe that he was—no one talked about Harry as though he were at all likely to be dating anyone but Ginny Weasley, although Merlin knew that had ended long enough ago. Draco rolled over in bed. Tomorrow (or today? It must be about 2:00 AM) was Saturday and although, technically speaking, Draco _could_ sleep in, he knew that he'd be up between 6 and 7 and already heading down to the Room of Requirement without breakfast. Waiting for Harry to turn up eventually. Merlin, he was pathetic.

** o**

Although Draco didn't know it, because he hadn't been paying attention to the time, he'd only had three hours of sleep by the time he rolled out of bed at 6:23 AM Saturday morning. He grabbed another book from the stack that Muggle Studies had assigned, even stopped by the Great Hall for coffee, and then trudged wearily to the hallway that would eventually show him the Room. Unsurprisingly, there was no door on the wall—Harry would probably be asleep for several hours yet. Draco sighed heavily as he paced the wall, thinking of a place to meet Harry—that no one but Harry would be able to get into—until he opened his eyes and the door had materialized. When he entered he almost laughed, but he was too tired. The usual sofa that the room he and Harry ordinarily occupied was gone; in its place was a large, green Slytherin bed. It could have been the one from Draco's room for all that it resembled that particular piece of furniture, complete with four posters and an emerald curtain. The only difference was that this bed was truly massive—the size of about one and a half king-sized beds—with a truly exorbitant amount of heavy green blankets.

There was a nightstand with a lamp on the far side of the bed, separating it from the wall, and Draco crawled to that side so that he'd have somewhere to read. He pointed his wand at the old-fashioned thing and muttered a quick _incendio_. It flared to life immediately and Draco sat back against the large pillows (as oversized and overdone as the rest of the bed—he wondered if it was meant to be to his tastes or if the room was traditionally extravagant in nature), pulling out his book. Long done with Hemingway, the volume in his hand now was a copy of Kurt Vonnegut's _Slaughter House Five_. He had no doubt that it would bore and confuse him with its Muggle references just as much as Hemingway's work had.

With this pessimistic view of Muggle literature, Draco commenced his reading.

** o**

Draco woke with a start.

He wasn't entirely sure what had woken him (or when he'd gone to sleep, exactly) but when he rolled over in the now-dim lamplight, feeling for his wand, he was greeted by an alarmed "Hey!" as his hand made contact with something that was definitely not a wand.

"Harry?" he asked, squinting into the dark. He heard a quiet "_Lumos maxima_" and had to turn away from the blinding light which appeared far too close to his eyes for that brightness to be comfortable.

"Sorry," Harry said, seeing his obvious irritation and directing his wand away accordingly. "It's just that I got in and the room was so bloody dark and the lamp was burning out and I couldn't see you on this giant _fucking_ bed. How long have you been here?"

"I don't bloody know, do I?" Draco retorted, still groggy. "I've been asleep. What time is it?"

"Almost noon now, I suppose."

"... a few hours." What an understatement. "How long have _you_ been here?"

"Only an hour or two. I realized you were here about half an hour ago; I just didn't want to wake you."

"How could you not think I was here? Why else would the door be there for you? And anyway, what have you been doing the entire time?"

"Well," Harry looked a little embarrassed. "There was the bed, and I was tired... I've been sleeping. You woke me up, actually—when you hit me in the face."

"Sorry about that." The apology was out before Draco had really thought about it; 'sorry' wasn't ordinarily a part of his Malfoy vocabulary. "Have you seen my wand? Never mind." Even as he said it, he spotted the slender piece of black wood just under Harry's right knee and reached for it, placing it on the nightstand. He had no idea where _Slaughter House Five _was, and if he was lucky he'd never have to see it again. Maybe Muggles did have a kind of magic if a book could put him to sleep after he'd been up half the night.

"Are you alright?" Harry asked him. "You look shattered."

"I didn't sleep much," Draco shrugged. "I never do."

"I'm sure Madame Pomfrey could make you a sleeping draught or something...?"

"I'm not keen on potions, thanks, Potter. I'll make them, but I'm not putting some ruddy chemical in my body just because I'm not getting enough rest."

Harry frowned. "I thought we'd agreed you wouldn't call me Potter?"

"I'm not going to apologize. I'm still tired and you're... suggesting things."

By way of response, Harry simply leaned over and kissed Draco gently, running one hand down his back as he did so. Draco nearly gasped—he still wasn't quite used to Harry being so intimate with him so casually. It always caught him by surprise, and it always caused his stomach to flutter nervously. It was a good nervousness, but still discomfiting. Harry pulled back smiling and Draco had a sneaking suspicion that the dark-haired Gryffindor knew exactly what he was doing.

"Anyway," he said, looking earnestly at Draco. "Hey."

"Hey," Draco laughed. He really didn't feel much like talking—and the best way he could think to prevent that unfortunate side-effect of Harry's presence was to kiss him again, which he did with enthusiasm. Harry wasn't arguing and responded by pushing Draco onto his back, straddling his hips and wrapping his arms around him. The blond bit at Harry's lower lip and slid his own hands up under the light T-shirt that was Harry's usual garb on weekends. This was familiar; they had spent many, many hours over the last few months in a similar embrace, although Draco frequently found that he wanted... more from the interaction. And by "more", of course, he meant "sex." That thought leapt to the front of his mind as Harry's lips moved from his lips to his jawbone, down to where his neck met his ear. Draco's body arched reflexively, hips grinding against the body above him, as Harry's lips touched the place on his neck that sent tremors through his body. He was conscious of Harry's erection, of the fact that this was the first time they had ever shared a bed, and then—suddenly—that Harry was thrusting rhythmically against him. Draco couldn't help the noise that escaped him, wholly involuntarily.

"You're so pushy," he growled and heard Harry chuckle, dimly. Draco found that he was distracted from the sound almost immediately by the feeling of two hands efficiently unbuttoning his shirt. _No_, Draco thought. _You first._ Harry's expression was one of mild surprise as Draco yanked his T-shirt up and over his head. The usually unkempt black hair was now in a state of comical disarray, but it didn't slow the Chosen One. Harry had exposed Draco's chest and was working his way down to the buttoned fly of his pants; the blond's stomach was fluttering. Draco wanted Harry to keep doing exactly what he was doing—but he also wanted so much more. Harry was unbuttoning his pants, pulling them down, and Draco gave himself over entirely.

** o**

"You know," Draco said, when they were lying next to one another, thoroughly exhausted. "You never did tell me what excuse you gave Weasley... when I petrified him, you know." The last bit was hesitant; after all, Harry was still reluctant to discuss the situation outside the Great Hall. To Draco's surprise, Harry laughed.

"Oh, he really did most of it himself." Harry's eyebrows drew together concernedly. "But you really would have done better to stun him or something—_petrificus totalus_? He could hear everything we said even after you'd hit him."

"What do you mean 'did most of it himself'?"

"Well, I suppose his first thought wasn't that we were about to—er—you know—"

Draco leaned over to kiss Harry hard on the mouth, placing on hand on the dark-haired boy's naked waist. "Do that?"

Harry smiled. "Exactly. So I guess we looked like we were having, ah... an intense discussion. He really just wanted to know what we'd been fighting about." Harry's expression was wry. "Especially since everyone in Gryffindor seemed to think we were such close mates."

"So what was it?"

"What was what?"

"What was it we were fighting about?" Draco asked, worming himself closer to Harry. The Golden Boy grinned and wrapped his arms around Draco.

"Well, nothing in particular... you were just being a slimy Slytherin git, as usual. Probably insulted my dead parents or something."

Draco's mouth twisted down at the corners and he was quiet for a while. When he spoke again, he sounded apologetic—which was not his typical tone. "You know I didn't really understand—"

"No, don't," Harry said, cutting him off. "Don't do that. It's easier for me to think of you—right now—as a totally different person than you were... before. You don't have to apologize for him."

Draco didn't know if he necessarily liked Harry dividing him into two people like that, just because it was less complicated, but he was glad that he didn't have to finish that sentence. He hadn't exactly thought it through and didn't know what, precisely, he'd been about to say. Besides, Draco could feel his recent lack of sleep beginning to sneak up on him... he simply rested his head on Harry's shoulder and allowed himself to doze.


	5. but they wanna kiss

**title** poor little rich boy  
><strong>prompt <strong>regina spektor's song by the same title  
><strong>pairing <strong>draco x harry

**more about **Listened to a lot of Regina. Want to keep the feeling consistent; trying to bring to mind chapter one—maybe music will help. Hi, I'm Dulcet, and I take 300 years to write a single fanfiction.  
><strong>on characterization<strong> I think some of you may find Harry OOC in this chapter, and I apologize. For me his attitude is a pretty natural progression; I think, after the war, he might have been inclined to expect everything to improve as if by magic—even his relationship with Draco (and Draco's relationship with Slytherin House)—and he'd be frustrated when it didn't work out that way. Passive-aggressive Harry is meant to be a little more mature (only a little) than raging-and-yelling Harry.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

**o**

"You know, if it's that bad in Slytherin, I can't think of a better time for you to show an active and open interest in our new friendship."

Draco looked up at Harry, aghast. He had been divulging, once again, his feelings on how predictably exclusionary Slytherin House was behaving towards him at present. Trust Harry to twist things around so that Draco's rant was about _them_. It certainly wasn't. This was all about Draco.

"Honestly, Harry, I thought we'd determined that we're not friends," the blond boy sighed, stalling.

"The two aren't mutually exclusive. You can be my friend and... y'know."

Draco knew.

"I'm just saying, you could at least talk to me around Ron and Hermione. They've noticed that you're not as nasty to them this year. Hermione said the other day that you might finally be turning into a real human being."

"I resent that," Draco muttered half-heartedly and then added, louder, "And Weasley wouldn't want me hanging around. Just because he's cottoned on that I don't insult him at every turn doesn't mean he wants to spend weekends in Hogsmeade with me." Draco felt the total cessation of movement that meant Harry's eyebrows were probably knit together in a neat frown. He didn't bother to lift his head and check; he just blew all the air out of his lungs and groaned.

"I'm not sitting at your table. I'm not coming to your common room. I'm not partnering with you lot for lessons. I won't have them thinking it's alright to be in the Room with us—" Draco _did_ pause to look up at Harry this time. "—because it's not. I'm not going prance around Hogsmeade with them."

"Well that's perfect," Harry said sardonically, raising his eyebrows. "You'll be mates in no time."

Draco blew out another heavy breath, paused long enough that Harry must have known precisely how unpleasant he found the concept of what he was about to offer and then said: "I _will_ greet them if we pass in the grounds."

"_Greet_ them?" Draco could almost hear the frustrated laughter in Harry's ton.

"Perhaps speak to them," was the fairly growled response. Harry was, at that point, wise enough to drop the subject.

**o**

It wasn't until that weekend that Harry had the opportunity to put Draco to the test. There had been subtle hints dropped into daily conversation with his best friends that suggested the fact that he was spending more time with Draco Malfoy. He was getting rather good at being coy, he thought, as the comments were not so offhand or blatant as to draw undue attention (such as "You know, Harry, it seems like you have a lot to say about Malfoy lately.") or vague enough that they might mistake who he was talking about. Hermione had raised her eyebrows a few times at first, and Ron still looked a mite disapproving, but on the whole Harry thought the experiment had been rather a success.

So it was that, on a misty Saturday morning as the trio wandered around the lake on their way down to Hagrid's hut, Harry felt bold enough to address Draco when he saw him just standing up from his seat by the water's edge.

"Hey, Draco!"

If Ron and Hermione looked surprised at this outburst, Draco himself looked thunderstruck—and then he looked mutinous. He waved awkwardly at Harry and company, said something under his breath that might have been construed as a greeting, tucked a book under his arm and began to head back toward the castle without making direct eye contact with any of them. Harry deflated.

"What a prig," Ron muttered, shoving his hands into his pockets. "I thought you were mates?"

And Harry, of course, had no answer.

**o**

After the visit with Hagrid, Harry excused himself from the common room ("Off to give Malfoy what for, I expect," he heard Ron say as he climbed through the portrait hole) and headed up to the Room of Requirement where, he hoped, Malfoy would be waiting. He did not necessarily want to give Malfoy—Draco—"what for", as Ron had put it. At least, Harry did not want to argue with Draco. What he wanted was to know exactly what the display down by the lake had been about. He paced the hallway in front of the door impatiently. It was part of their arrangement that the door appeared to the other person whenever one of them was inside the Room, but they found that they were still unable to enter unless they had performed the ritual walk in the hallway. And Harry knew from experience that, even if Malfoy were inside, the door did not appear to him if he wasn't alone.

Walk completed, Harry opened his eyes and reached for the door handle, willing himself not to get worked up over something as stupid as a snub. Just because he was offended didn't mean that there wasn't a reason that Malfoy had been such a—

"Git." Ah. Not the right opening, but the word had left Harry's mouth before he'd thought it through. Malfoy looked up from the bed where he sat (it had become a staple in the Room since that day it had first appeared, though the couch was there as well) and his eyebrows knit together. "What was that about, down by the lake?"

"You surprised me," Draco said, rather quietly. "And I didn't know what to do."

"How hard is it to say, 'Hi, Harry, Ron, Hermione'?" Harry returned, crossing his arms across his chest. "You've set me back about ten steps trying to get them used to the idea of you."

"Well, I'm certainly not going to go so far as given names." Draco was trying to lighten the mood, but his rejection still stung and Harry was having none of it. He stood in stony silence, glaring at Draco from the doorway, until the Slytherin forced a deep breath. "Look, Harry, you don't understand. It's not that I don't want to acknowledge you—politely—in public. It's a difficult concept, but I think I do. It's that it's not an easy transition."

"You think this is the easiest thing I've ever done?" Harry shot back, struck by the fact that even though he wasn't used to having friendly conversation with Draco in public it wasn't that hard for _him_. Draco seemed to be thinking along the same lines.

"You haven't a proud bone in your body, Gryffindor that you are. I'm made entirely of them." Harry couldn't know that, although part of the issue was Draco's pride, another part was the unutterable fact that the first things Draco still thought when he looked at Granger and Weasley were "mudblood" and "blood traitor." He did not try to, but 18 years of prejudice are not erased by a casual sexual relationship with The Boy Who Lived. Harry, softened a little by the unintentional compliment Draco had paid him by calling him a Gryffindor, made his way to the bed and crawled up to sit next to Draco. The blond boy, still unsure of where their relationship stood after his slip up, made no effort to get any closer—but he needn't have worried, as Harry took the liberty of laying an arm across Draco's shoulders.

"I'm not asking you to change in a day, Draco. I'm just asking you to make more of an effort than you did today." Without knowing why, Draco felt as though he'd been chastised and was properly (unusually) ashamed. By way of apology, he leaned into Harry and nodded.

"I think I can do that."

Harry kissed Draco's temple, a gesture so gentle and intimate that it was almost uncomfortable, and folded him into an embrace.

**o**

It turned out that their relationship carried on in that vein for nearly a month. Draco felt that he was becoming uncharacteristically weak and flexible. After the fiasco at the lakeside, he had made a genuine effort to improve his interactions with Granger and Weasley, and (several weeks later) found that he had the courage to nod amiably when he passed Granger in the halls, even when Harry did not accompany her. He had shared a table with them at their last double potions lesson—as much Slughorn's fault as by his own choice—despite the conditions he had originally laid out for Harry. Draco was beginning to feel like his say in the relationship was dwindling... even that Harry was being a little manipulative. Not intentionally, of course, but it was a wonder that he hadn't been sorted to Slytherin House with the way he was capable of twisting Draco's arm. Harry could be almost as good as having any of his old Slytherin friends back, with the way that he could joke and banter with Draco (plus the added benefit of being an excellent shag)—but when he was unhappy with Draco, because the Slytherin had made one of his frequent mistakes, he would lapse into brooding silences and spend all their time in the Room working on schoolwork.

Draco daren't bring it up, either. He had tried, once, after he had been particularly publicly neglectful of Harry. He knew that was his own fault, but after weeks of being flawlessly attentive to their new friendship—and getting the requisite dirty looks from members of his own House—Draco had needed a break from his newly Harry-centric habits. He'd spent the entire day to himself, loitering around the Slytherins as though he still fit in. It hadn't exactly been pleasant, but it was a nice change to listen to the haughty discourse that had always been so familiar as opposed to the Gryffindor niceties that he had recently been enduring. It had, perhaps, been a little abrupt but Harry had apparently been so offended that when they next met in the Room he had taken a seat on the bed, across the room from where Draco was on the couch.

"Not going to sit with me?" Draco as casually, maybe a little too faux-obtuse.

"I figured you'd had enough of me," Harry shrugged, not looking up. "Thought I'd let you carry on."

"Oh, come off it. You wouldn't have come to the Room if you wanted to let me alone. You're here to rub my nose in it. And you know that I have no problem at all being with you here... it's a—safe zone."

Harry was silent.

"I'd just had enough of hanging about with Gryffindors," Draco told him, willing Harry to speak and understand. He was half gratified.

"Well, I thought you enjoyed talking to me," Harry said. "My mistake." Draco wasn't used to passive-aggressive, post-war Harry. The Gryffindor had always been quick to anger and had never been quiet about expressing it, as he was being now. If Harry had simply said what he meant and tried to have an actual discussion, Draco might have been able to make him see his side. As it was, they were getting nowhere.

"Look, I'm sorry." That hated word again. "I'm not trying to shake you off or make you feel like I don't want to be around you." There was an uncomfortable tension.

"Alright." Harry did not sound as though he thought that was the least bit alright.

Again acting against his natural tendencies, Draco stood and went to Harry this time. Although they spent the remainder of the day sitting together, Harry remained cool. It took days for him to return to his usual, friendly self and those were an uncomfortable few days for Draco. Harry expected him to be friendly and to interact with the Gryffindors but Harry himself insisted on being nothing but polite and distant... not very encouraging, considering Draco did not have any particular motivation of his own for doing so. When Harry finally decided to behave normally, Draco was so relieved that he resolved himself to try much harder in the future to prevent such a scene. It certainly wasn't worth the day of familiarity—he was finding that Harry was more important to him than that shallow comfort, though he was loathe to admit it.

He did not, at this moment, feel much like Draco Malfoy.


	6. and they got homes of their own

****title**** poor little rich boy**  
><strong>prompt <strong>**regina spektor's song by the same title**  
><strong>pairing <strong>**draco x harry

**more about **No music. Just background noise. This is quickly turning into a fiction where I visit every exhausted trope and plot device in the fandom because Drarry. This chapter: everyone gets drunk. Spoiler alert, Draco doesn't sleep at night and that means he sometimes sleeps when I could be writing something relevant to the plot. I like this because it's how insomnia works. It catches up to you and it fucks up the normal flow of your life (you either sleep when you shouldn't, or you're so exhausted that you might as well be sleeping.)

**re: eye of rabbit, harp string hum** "It is unknown if this is a real spell or not, although given that Seamus could turn the water into a weak tea it is likely that it is but he could not perform it correctly." I'm using it like it's real. Deal with it.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

**o o o**

He would never admit it, but a muggle novel was actually what had got Draco Malfoy thinking. There was a particular line in Slaughterhouse-Five that went: "I have this disease late at night sometimes, involving alcohol and the telephone." It would not, perhaps, have affected him so strongly if it hadn't been a Friday night. Being that it was a weekend evening, Draco was allowing his insomnia to run away with him and was up reading at three in the morning. And because it was three in the morning and he was in precisely the mood that the author was describing, Draco understood. Short years ago, he wouldn't even have known what a telephone was—but being that he was significantly better read on the topic of muggles now than he had ever been, due in large part to the class that had assigned this book, even that concept did not evade him. Contemplating the mood, however, Draco realized that a telephone was an unnecessary addition to the formula. It was a symbol of communication that could take place in a variety of more or less direct ways, depending on your personality or magical aptitude. All you needed was the eerie fascination of three AM and enough drink strong enough to add to the intoxication.

In a more romantic frame of mind, Draco would find himself chuckling at the fact of muggle author Kurt Vonnegut indirectly encouraging him to get Harry Potter pissed.

Like many other Hogwarts students, Draco Malfoy had been well and truly drunk once or twice since his seventeenth birthday. (And maybe once or twice before—Slytherins were not known for their propensity to good behaviour and obeying rules.) And there _were_ strict rules against alcohol in the dormitories and, in fact, against being inebriated on the Hogwarts grounds. Too many of the students were underage and of course that kind of raucous and undisciplined behaviour was frowned upon. The more well-to-do establishments in Hogsmeade had limits on the amount of alcohol they would serve to students and it would be a hefty punishment for anyone returning from the little village significantly inebriated. Besides, for the plan that was slowly formulating in Draco's sleep-deprived mind, a public session of insobriety was not what he required. ... Required. Hmm. Well that was an interesting thought.

Draco, grinning, resigned himself to a true effort at sleep. He waved his wand to extinguish the light he had been reading by and settled into his bed, plotting to test his plan in the morning.

**o o o**

Of course it hadn't worked. One of the five Principal Exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration. Of course the room wouldn't be able to create food (or drink, as Draco was more interested in.) He had spent the early hours of Saturday morning—sleep had not come to him and he had decided that he would find the opportunity to nap sometime later in the day—pacing the seventh floor, thinking determinedly of a "place to get Harry Potter drunk." While the room had come with a cupboard full of glasses and a few promising-looking bottles, it did not have the means to fill them. Otherwise it appeared to be very similar to their old room, with a few couches and the bed which was now a staple. Draco spent some time wandering around, looking into cupboards, and fretting over the problem of actually getting alcohol into a room that shouldn't, by rights, exist—but the result was not a working solution... it was Draco, sleeping face down on the smaller couch for about four hours.

When he woke, bleary-eyed, to a strange noise in the Room, Draco did not immediately understand what was happening. Firstly because he didn't know where he was and secondly because the rectification of the first problem was hindered by the fact that he could see nothing but couch cushions. Pushing himself up off the couch, and running a casual hand through his hair as he did so, Draco looked to the door and to see Harry standing there... looking as though he were about to laugh. To his credit, Harry didn't make any mention of the newly added furniture (although it seemed that there was something else in the Room every time they used it), simply making his way to the couch to sit next to Draco.

"Did you sleep here last night?" he asked, grinning.

"I didn't sleep anywhere last night," Draco muttered, unhappy to be awake with his plan still half-formed. "Hence my need to sleep here, in the middle of the day. What time is it, exactly?"

Harry raised an eyebrow and glanced at the clock above the door. "About one o'clock."

"And I was about to tell you off for being here before noon. I'm meant to be working on a bit of a project here, that I'd hoped to be done before you showed up... Do you have schoolwork to do, or something?"

"Well, I could always leave and come back...?"

Draco shot him a glare. "Don't you dare. I've barely seen you outside of classes all week."

Harry chuckled and pressed a quick kiss on Draco's lips. "Then maybe I can help you with your 'project'?"

"That depends. What are you doing tonight?"

"It sounds like I'm spending the night with you in the Room of Requirement."

"Excellent choice. Let me explain the problem."

Draco informed Harry as to the issue of smuggling alcohol into the Room—which, of course, meant informing Harry that he intended them to spend the evening drinking—and they immediately began bouncing ideas off one another. Harry seemed dubious at first and Draco assumed that it was because his experiences with alcohol were probably limited, if not entirely nonexistent. Probably never had more than a Butterbeer in his life, poor boy. Well. Draco would see to that. No matter how nervous Harry was about the prospect of drinking with Draco (or drinking at all), he was still enthusiastic with his suggestions. Enthusiastic, but useless. In the end it was Draco who answered the question for himself.

"Transfiguration!" he crowed, triumphant. "Who's going to stop us carrying water? I mean, no one would think to stop us carrying fire whiskey, either, but water is easier to get hold of."

"Transfiguration? What, 'eye of rabbit, harp string hum'...?" Harry asked, genuinely curious. There were kinds of magic that he had not been exposed to during his time at Hogwarts—and outside it—and those used in the procuring of alcohol fell squarely within that category. Although apparently he had more knowledge than he expected, as Draco was giving him a very odd look.

"What a positively medieval incantation. Where on earth did you pick that up?"

"Seamus Finnegan, first year..." Harry mumbled. Draco's look got odder.

"And you've stored that bit of knowledge away for 7 years?"

"I don't know! Can we use it or not?"

"Well, I don't see why not..."

Draco retrieved two glasses from the cupboard, cast a quick _aguamenti_, and for the next hour they set about practicing the incantation—and neither of them managed to blow up the liquid, the cup, themselves, or each other. Draco was the first to manage anything even vaguely alcoholic and it was so watered down that it barely tasted of anything. He was so frustrated that he tossed the glass across the room, having emptied it.

"We'd need to drink liters of this stuff," Draco growled. "Even if we manage to get it twice as strong as this, we'd still need bottles full and we're not going to be able to cast the charm consistently."

"Better get cracking, then." Harry said helpfully, and went back to charming his own glass.

**o o o**

They took a break to go down to the Great Hall and eat dinner with their respective houses and, for Harry's part, to socialize with the friends who hadn't seem him all day. He was grateful that they had one another, as they didn't seem to mind as much as they might have that their friend was spending so much time with Draco Malfoy. Draco was already in the Room by the time Harry made his way back upstairs, working away on another glass of water. Tipping the whole glass back at the end of each incantation, and refilling it with water to start anew when the drink was unsatisfactory.

"If you're not careful, you're going to be drunk before the party starts," Harry said, noticing that Draco's attempts were definitively browner than they had been as he settled down beside the Slytherin and started on his own glass. Draco made a noncommittal noise by way of response, but began to take sips rather than drinking the entire glass.

Harry was the one who managed the first true glass of rum. He motioned to Draco excitedly and the Slytherin took a sip, wincing as he did so.

"Not a particularly good rum, but it'll suit our purposes. The key is alcohol content, not taste. It'll do." He looked scornfully at the half glass that remained. "Now we just have to do this again... and again... and again."

"Can't we just... y'know... _Gemino_ it?"

Draco cast him a disparaging glance—intended to hide the fact that he was a little impressed with the idea.

"_Gemino_'s a curse, Potter. It's for bewitching objects to duplicate under a certain set of circumstances. _Geminio_ is the charm. And... excellent point."

"Watch it with that 'Potter' stuff, _Malfoy_."

"Fine, fine. But see if you can get a new glass as good as this. So we're not duplicating backwash..."

By the time they had two bottles full of strong rum (and not a little spilled on the floor due to miscalculated _geminio_ charms), it was just after 8:00 o'clock and they were laughing triumphantly. Draco, perhaps, a little excited in anticipation of the final culmination of his plan, which was going so perfectly thus far.

"So..." Harry asked, looking a little uneasy again. It was refreshing to Draco that he could make Harry uncomfortable—considering how uncomfortable Harry's attitude had made him over the last month. "Do we start now?"

"No, I don't think so," Draco grinned. "A party never starts this early."

"You keep calling it a party... yet there are only two of us. You haven't invited a lot of Slytherins up here, have you?"

"Don't be daft. I wouldn't want to overwhelm you at your first party."

"I've been to _parties_, Draco," Harry scowled, obviously offended by the slight on his social status. "And this isn't a party anyway."

"More of a party than you've been to yet. Because you're going to be drunk."

"I don't think the involvement of alcohol is what makes it a party."

"Quiet. It's a party." And Draco leaned across their well-filled bottles to put his hand on the back of Harry's neck and draw them together in a kiss.


	7. and you don't love your girlfriend

****title**** poor little rich boy**  
><strong>prompt <strong>**regina spektor's song by the same title**  
><strong>pairing <strong>**draco x harry

**more about** Written at the same time as the last chapter. Just saved it for editing for a bit. (Because I am actually waiting for reviews like a loser. I want input prior to posting chapters so that I know what to keep, what to change, what you actually want to see. For instance: This chapter is leading up to imminent sex. Because apparently, based on reviews, you're into that.) Your suggestions hasten my writing, just don't get too specific.

**disclaimer **None of the characters included in this story belong to me. At all. Every one of them belongs to the excessively talented Joanne K Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series. I only manipulate these personalities in the name of curiosity. On the other hand, all content of these fictions is written by and copyright to me.

**o o o**

All told, it didn't really start the way that Harry thought a party should. From all his experiences with celebratory, post-win Gryffindor ragers and Slughorn's exclusive little tea parties, he had not expected the beginning to be quite so lazy and... fuzzy. Its starting point was not definite—the only thing of which he was even remotely certain was that by the time midnight finally rolled around, his senses were no longer what they had been. This was a fact that, to Harry, was absolutely marvellous. And he had been describing it in rapt and enthusiastic detail for, perhaps, an hour.

"Eyes are moving faster than my head."

Draco wiped a tear from his eye (that had escaped during a fit of mirth in response to a similar comment) and tried to control himself as fresh laughter bubbled up inside him. He had never seen Harry behave even remotely like this. It wasn't that the Gryffindor was in the same bubbly state as Draco himself (Draco, who had ingested marginally less alcohol and who was considerably better at handling it). It was that he was _so damn focused._ Harry's brow was wrinkled and he looked as though he were trying to put a drunken finger on what exactly felt so different. It was charming, and a new experience for Draco, whose only prior involvement with first-time drunks had been when he was also sufficiently inexperienced... and liquored. To be (well, alright, a little less than) sober and enjoying the flushed and prattling Harry was almost enough to make the entire night worth it in and of itself. Almost. Drunk Harry was actually the person who reminded Draco of what he'd been intending to do when he originally planned this whole evening.

"What're we doing... again?" Harry asked, marking the last word with a hand gesture somewhere between a wave and a point.

"Can't tell you. Sorry, 'Arry. Hafta wait for 3.00 am."

"Wha's happenin' at 3.00 am?" The question was belligerent. As if Harry could not believe that Draco had planned a surprise for such an absolutely stupid hour.

Draco raised an eyebrow and glanced sidelong at Harry, who did not seem to notice the expression in the least. "Well. S'not 3.00 am exactly. It's more like... how y' feel at 3.00 am." Harry did not respond. He was looking dead ahead so blankly that Draco wondered briefly if he'd fallen asleep sitting up—and then the green eyes swivelled to meet his. The Slytherin became very serious for a moment. Thought hard about enunciating his words clearly. "You know that feeling, when you've been up too late, and you feel very... nostalgic?"

If at all imaginable, Harry looked blanker still.

Taking that as an indication that he should continue, Draco said: "When you're alone at night and you start to think about your life and where it's going and what's important. Come on. You know."

Harry snorted through his nose. "No."

"Oh. Well."

Those green eyes closed pensively and then opened again. "I think about that stuff all th' time."

"No," Draco said, shaking his head and feeling the room swim dangerously. He should not drink anymore. "This is different. It's sad and scary."

Harry leaned forward, his eyebrows drawn in an expression that was at once confused and vaguely sympathetic. It seemed that he thought Draco was both talking about things that he did not understand and incredibly stupid for not understanding them. "Draco," Harry said slowly. "I thought I was going t' die last year."

A pause, and a look flitted across Harry's face to suggest that he had just remembered something.

"I did die last year."

Oh. Well, yes, perhaps if one had been through hell and back (maybe literally, Draco didn't know what one saw when they were killed by the greatest Dark Wizard of all time) that did tend to tinge all their thoughts of the future with a certain sort of melancholy. He had never stopped to consider that Harry Potter was living in a perpetual haze of 3.00 am. Who would, though, really. And how was his rum-addled mind expected to come up with any idea of what exactly that meant?

Harry was talking again. Draco really must try to focus.

"... so if there's something y' were savin' for 3.00 am, you're just as safe t' say it now. It's late 'nough and I'm drunk besides." Harry looked at him expectantly.

Now it was uncomfortable. Harry wasn't meant to have _cottoned on to his plan_ and said that bit about _dying last year_. He was supposed to get pleasantly tipsy and a little tired and open up to having a fathoms-deep conversation about their feelings and their relationship. Draco wasn't meant to... well, _start_ it.

"S'just general..." the blond mumbled.

Harry slid over so that they were sitting side by side against the wall instead of one across from the other. His sloppy grin was mirroring Draco's expression from earlier in the evening and he placed his lips against Draco's neck, just behind his ear.

"C'mon," he muttered, sending a distinct shiver up Draco's spine. "You can tell me." The _E_ in _me_ was drawn out longer than was strictly necessary, but Draco wasn't complaining. It sent a warm ghost of breath across his earlobe. He did not really want to say anything that might break the mood—Harry was being incredibly sexy—but he did have some rather important things that he wanted to address.

"Well... the Room." Draco paused and Harry placed a soft kiss on the crook of his neck. The Slytherin thought that it would perhaps be best to simply plow onward in order to avoid the imminent distraction. "We spend all our time t'gether... here. We don't really have a relationship outside it."

"So?"

Draco considered that response to be the positive definition of the word _cheating_. _So,_ what? he wanted to shout. _What does _so_ mean_?

Instead he asked: "So... is that even a relationship?"

"Well." Harry seemed to be thinking very hard. After a pause long enough that Draco almost assumed that he wasn't going to go on, he said, "I think... a relationship is pretty much—jus' a connection. Between any two things. So. Yeah. It is."

Draco gaped.

"Harry Potter. You absolute _smart arse_." And then Harry's laughter was ringing around the room as he buried his face in Draco's shoulder completely.

"I fully regret allowing you any alcohol and we shan't do this ever again." That quieted Harry and he looked rather contrite as he waited for Draco to continue. The Slytherin took a condescending (but nonetheless steadying) breath. "Are we... is this dating?"

"What?"

"Are we... are we in a proper relationship? Are we acshully dating?" Oops. Draco's rum-sodden tongue had gotten a bit ahead of itself on the pronunciation of that particular word. And he'd been doing so well.

"Yeah..." Harry seemed put off—and then continued with new conviction: "Yeah! Yeah. Yes. Yer my boyfriend."

Well, that was that settled for now. Draco was content in the fact that, while Harry was being a bit of an idiot, he certainly was not drunk enough to forget what had just come out of his mouth. Aware that he himself had blurred his Gryffindor partner's judgment a tad, however, Draco could not resist clarifying: "And you would say that if, and will agree to it still when, you are sober?"

"Well. Yeah. I'm tipsy, 'm not _imperio_ed, Draco."

Grinning rather like a drunken idiot himself, Draco leaned over to press his mouth against Harry's. The Gryffindor met him with a hand raised to cup the side of his face and Draco slid a hand hungrily under Harry's shirt to touch the smooth skin of his lower back. Harry was quite warm. Actually, now that he thought about it, Draco was feeling rather warm himself. He pulled out of the kiss and Harry followed him, leaning his head against Draco's shoulder absently.

"Don't go to sleep," the blond cautioned. "I have another question for you."

Harry made a noise in response that Draco had occasionally overheard him make when Granger asked if he and Weasley had done a particularly large assignment just yet.

"Just the one."

"Fine."

"Why do you insist on punishing me with coldness?" Harry's shoulders went a little tense and Draco leaned his cheek against Harry's head. "I just want to know what you were... trying to achieve." Draco felt Harry's muscles relax a little and the Gryffindor slumped against him.

"Dunno, Draco," and when the blond _tsk_ed disapprovingly, Harry carried on. "No, I'm serious. I was just hurt and I wanted to be away from you and it was stupid. Jus' easier to be quiet than to be mean."

"I'd say you were pretty effectively both."

"Hey!" Harry said, and it was the sound of a man who had just had an epiphany. "You said... you said you wanted a relationship outside th' Room. Well I tried that. Remember, I tried t'do that? You. You couldn't even say _hi_ to me."

"Well, yeah," Draco replied, as though it were obvious. "That was then. I didn't _know_ I wanted a Roomless relationship."

Draco had worried that perhaps that answer would offend Harry—and in fact he had winced as the words left his mouth—but Harry only grinned and wrapped both arms around Draco's waist, drawing them closer together. He was obviously glossing over the fact of Draco's prior uncertainty to focus on the reassurance he had just received that the Slytherin did, now, want a relationship with him. For Draco's part, he thought that was precisely as it should be and was simply relieved that he would not have to retract and refine the statement. Please, and feeling distinctly warm and fuzzy, Draco allowed his eyes to drift shut—and woke with a jolt, seemingly seconds later, after a brief and terrifying sensation of falling.

"What time is it!?" he asked, perhaps over-enthusiastically, before he had even fully registered what had just happen.

Harry startled similarly and glanced at the clock. "Quarter past one. Merlin. Draco, I'm tired."

"Sounds like—" there was a brief break as Draco yawned loudly, and then continued as though uninterrupted. "—you partied yourself out far too early."

"Maybe you just... throw a rotten party."

"If you keep talking like that, I'm not going to let you sleep in the bed."

"No, no, I'm sorry, please let me go to bed."

Draco couldn't help but laugh out loud as he staggered to his feet. His bones ached and he had the distinct feeling that the shadow of a bruise was slowly appearing on his tailbone. The floor was never a comfortable place to sleep, let alone in a sitting position. Only a swaying a little himself, the Slytherin grasped Harry's hand in his own and pulled the drunken Golden Boy to his feet. Harry teetered on his feet for a moment and then wrapped both arms around Draco's midsection, burying his face in his neck for not the first time that night. The action knocked Draco off balanced and they both stumbled back towards the bed before Draco tripped and had to throw a hand out to catch himself.

"To bed, Mr. Potter," he said, in his most professor-ly tone. "You have become a menace. This public intoxication is disgraceful."

"Shut up, Malfoy," Harry mumbled, already pulling off his jeans until he was wearing only boxers and a T-shirt. "I'm trying to sleep."

"Not standing up, you're not."

"I said shut up," was the muttered response as Harry crawled into bed. It took Draco less than a moment to divulge himself of all but sleep wear and climb under the blankets next to him. He was smiling his way to sleep as Harry ran lazy hands over his back, planting sleepy kisses along his collarbone.


End file.
